I am fundraising to Wo din, Wo baat

Are we ready to talk about it? We want to. But we need your support in this!

A young girl, not more than 11 or 12 years old, is suddenly told not to go out and play with boys from her colony as she has now 'grown up'. What that means is that she has started getting her periods.

She misses school as she is embarrassed to have this 'condition', is hesitant to talk to her friends about it and also, does not know the proper reason why this is happening to her.

Menstrual Health & Hygiene have been one of the most important but neglected aspect among the young girls and women. Poor menstrual hygiene not only affects physical health, but also social and mental well-being, and thus is a violation of the human right to health.

The statistics are much worse. More than 23% young girls in schools drop out from schools and don’t have adequate access to menstrual hygiene. There seems to be a widening gap in terms of information failure among them about the same. Plus, the taboo associated with menstruation has hindered any further growth in terms of knowledge sharing. Poor menstrual health, stigmas and lack of information may result in more stress, fear, shame and social exclusion.

The School Girls, being an important lot, are affected by the above. Therefore, we at Kaivalya Education Foundation, Mumbai have decided to take a small initiative to address the issue of information failure and knowledge gap in the schools of Mumbai. It will be shaped as sensitization cum awareness sessions on Menstrual Health and Hygiene. We are planning to target children of standard 5 to 10th of 5 schools (as pilot schools) in Byculla, South Mumbai through our sessions

At the same time, these sessions would also cover sexual health topics in order to break the taboo.

Thanks to your amazing support, we have achieved our goal of raising Rs 15,950 in a matter of only 2 DAYS!

A BIG shoutout to all the contributors who have donated to our cause. We will work our level best to achieve maximum possible results.

We would also like to thank the many people who supported us by sharing and talking about our initiative and helped in spreading the word. You all are exceptional people! :')

However, our job has just begun! We are trying to reach the maximum possible children such that they can benefit from your contribution. We also want to start the conversation with as many people as possible about periods and the normalcy of the issue.

Looking at the support and interest, we have decided to launch the second phase of our campaign prematurely (all thanks to you guys!).

We are planning to expand our awareness sessions to more schools and for that, we would need more pads and comic books. Apart from spreading awareness, sharing the right information with the kids and talking about the issue, we want to establish certain sustainable implements in the school, as well as the slum community. Hence, working on safe and hygienic disposal is our next goal to achieve.

It is quite a surprise that there are no dustbins installed, when one visits bathrooms in the school and community. Sanitary napkins are thrown without being wrapped in paper, exposing everyone around to diseases and infections. Sometimes, they are flushed down the toilet as there are no proper means of disposal. We want to tackle this issue.

In the schools which we are targetting for sensitization, we also plan to install proper dustbins in each toilet. Generally there is only one dustbin in the bathroom- which is also not used and gets misplaced. Our dustbins will be a tad different ! We have come this far only through your support and wish to go even further, hoping to impact as many lives- even through the smallest of ideas. After all, big things have small beginnings :)